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<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">The ‘Begin Doctrine’: World Must Force Israel to Dismantle Its Nuclear Arsenal</h1>
<div class="gmail-credits gmail-reader-credits">December 1, 2022</div></div><div class="gmail-content"><div class="gmail-moz-reader-content gmail-reader-show-element"><div id="gmail-readability-page-1" class="gmail-page"><div><img src="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Dimona-678x455.png" alt="" title="Dimona" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;" width="392" height="263">
Benjamin Netanyahu attends the renaming ceremony for the Shimon Peres
Negev Nuclear Research Center. (photo: Via Prime Minister of Israel TW
Page)
<p><strong>By <a href="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/writers/ramzy-baroud" title="Display all articles for Ramzy Baroud">Ramzy Baroud</a></strong></p><p>As western countries are <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/russia-ukraine-nuclear-war-fear-us-policy/672020/">floating</a>
the theory that Russia could escalate its conflict with Ukraine to a
nuclear war, many western governments continue to turn a blind eye to
Israel’s own nuclear weapons capabilities. Luckily, many countries
around the world do not subscribe to this endemic western hypocrisy.</p>
<p>‘The Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction’ was <a href="https://meetings.unoda.org/me-nwmdfz/conference-establishment-middle-east-zone-free-nuclear-weapons-third-session-2022#:~:text=The%20Third%20Session%20of%20the,of%20the%20Conference%20is%20Lebanon.">held</a>
between November 14-18, with the sole purpose of creating new standards
of accountability that, as should have always been the case, be applied
equally to all Middle Eastern countries.</p>
<p>The debate regarding nuclear weapons in the Middle East could not
possibly be any more pertinent or urgent. International observers
rightly <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/03/15/nuclear-arms-control-race-russia-ukraine-america/">note</a>
that the period following the Russia-Ukraine war is likely to
accelerate the quest for nuclear weapons throughout the world.
Considering the seemingly perpetual state of conflict in the Middle
East, the region is likely to witness nuclear rivalry as well.</p>
<p>For years, Arab and other countries attempted to raise the issue that
accountability regarding the development and acquisition of nuclear
weapons cannot be confined to states that are perceived to be enemies of
Israel and the West.</p>
<p>The latest of these efforts was a United Nations resolution that
called on Israel to dispose of its nuclear weapons, and to place its
nuclear facilities under the monitoring of the International Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA). Resolution number A/C.1/77/L.2, which was drafted
by Egypt with the support of other Arab countries, <a href="https://www.jpost.com/international/article-720993">passed</a>
with an initial vote of 152-5. Unsurprisingly, among the five countries
that voted against the draft were the United States, Canada and, of
course, Israel itself.</p>
<p>US and Canadian blind support of Tel Aviv notwithstanding, what
compels Washington and Ottawa to vote against a draft entitled: “The
risk of nuclear proliferation in the Middle East”? Keeping in mind the
successive right-wing extremist governments that have ruled over Israel
for many years, Washington must understand that the risk of using
nuclear weapons under the guise of fending off an ‘existential threat’
is a real possibility.</p>
<p>Since its inception, Israel has resorted to, and utilized the phrase
‘existential threat’ countless times. Various Arab governments, later
Iran and even individual Palestinian resistance movements were accused
of endangering Israel’s very existence. Even the non-violent Palestinian
civil society-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) Movement was
accused by then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 2015 of <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/why-bds-replacing-iran-israels-biggest-existential-threat">being</a>
an existential threat to Israel. Netanyahu claimed that the boycott
movement was “not connected to our actions; it is connected to our very
existence.</p>
<p>This should worry everyone, not just in the Middle East, but the
whole world. A country with such hyped sensitivity about imagined
‘existential threats’ should not be allowed to acquire the kind of
weapons that could destroy the entire Middle East, several times over.</p>
<p>Some may argue that Israel’s nuclear arsenal was intrinsically linked
to real fears resulting from its historical conflict with the Arabs.
However, this is not the case. As soon as Israel finalized its ethnic
cleansing of Palestinians from their historic homeland, and long before
any serious Arab or Palestinian resistance was carried out in response,
Israel was already on the lookout for nuclear weapons.</p>
<p>As early as 1949, the Israeli army had <a href="https://www.thecairoreview.com/timelines/nuclear-non-proliferation-and-disarmament-in-the-middle-east/">found</a> uranium deposits in the Negev Desert, leading to the <a href="https://www.wagingpeace.org/israel-history-brief/">establishment</a>, in 1952, of the very secretive Israel Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC).</p>
<p>In 1955, the US government <a href="https://www.nti.org/analysis/articles/israel-nuclear/">sold</a> Israel a nuclear research reactor. But that was not enough. Eager to become a full nuclear power, Tel Aviv <a href="https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/nukevault/ebb510/">resorted</a>
to Paris in 1957. The latter became a major partner in Israel’s
sinister nuclear activities when it helped the Israeli government
construct a clandestine nuclear reactor near Dimona in the Negev Desert.</p>
<p>The father of the Israeli nuclear program at the time was none other than Shimon Peres who, ironically, was <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1994/press-release/">awarded</a> the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994. The Dimona Nuclear Reactor is now <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2016-10-09/ty-article/dimona-nuclear-reactor-to-be-renamed-after-shimon-peres/0000017f-db88-db5a-a57f-dbea94e80000">named</a> ‘Shimon Peres Nuclear Research Center-Negev’.</p>
<p>With no international monitoring whatsoever, thus with zero legal
accountability, Israel’s nuclear quest continues until this day. In
1963, Israel <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/02/israels-secret-uranium-buy/">purchased</a>
100 tons of uranium ore from Argentina, and it is strongly believed
that during the October 1973 Israel-Arab war, Israel “came close to
making a nuclear preemptive strike”, according to Richard Sale, <a href="https://www.upi.com/Defense-News/2002/09/16/Yom-Kippur-Israels-1973-nuclear-alert/64941032228992/">writing</a> in United Press International (UPI).</p>
<p>Currently, Israel is <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13537120008719576?journalCode=fisa20">believed</a>
to have “enough fissionable material to fabricate 60-300 nuclear
weapons,” according to former US Army Officer Edwin S. Cochran.</p>
<p>Estimates vary, but the facts about Israel’s weapons of mass
destruction (WMDs) are hardly contested. Israel itself practices what is
<a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13537120008719576?journalCode=fisa20">known</a>
as ‘deliberate ambiguity’, as to send a message to its enemies of its
lethal power, without revealing anything that may hold it accountable to
international inspection.</p>
<p>What we know about Israel’s nuclear weapons has been made possible
partly because of the bravery of a former Israeli nuclear technician
Mordechai Vanunu, a whistleblower who was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/09/israel-fresh-charges-nuclear-whistleblower-mordechai-vanunu">held</a> in solitary confinement for a decade due to his courage in exposing Israel’s darkest secrets.</p>
<p>Still, Israel <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-israel-nuclear-treaty-idUSTRE64S1ZN20100529">refuses</a> to sign the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), endorsed by 191 countries.</p>
<p>Israeli leaders adhere to what is <a href="https://www.inss.org.il/publication/the-begin-doctrine-the-lessons-of-osirak-and-deir-ez-zor/">known</a>
as the ‘Begin Doctrine’, in reference to Menachem Begin, the rightwing
Israeli prime minister who invaded Lebanon in 1982, resulting in the
killing of thousands. The doctrine is formulated around the idea that,
while Israel gives itself the right to own nuclear weapons, its enemies
in the Middle East must not. This belief continues to direct Israeli
actions to this day.</p>
<p>The US support for Israel is not confined to ensuring the latter has
‘military edge’ over its neighbors in terms of traditional weapons, but
to also ensuring Israel remains the region’s only superpower, even if
that entails escaping international accountability for the development
of WMDs.</p>
<p>The collective efforts by Arab and other countries at the UNGA to
create a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons are welcomed
initiatives. It behooves everyone, Washington included, to join the rest
of the world in finally forcing Israel to join the Non-Proliferation
Treaty, a first but critical step towards long-delayed accountability.</p>
<div><p><br></p><p><span><i><span>-
Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle.
He is the author of six books. His latest book, co-edited with Ilan
Pappé, is “Our Vision for Liberation: Engaged Palestinian Leaders and
Intellectuals Speak out”. Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research
Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA). His website is</span></i><a href="http://www.ramzybaroud.net/"> <i><span>www.ramzybaroud.net</span></i></a></span></p></div>
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